Descriptions:
Video Description
Is astrology real, or is it just make-believe science? That is the question in this thoughtful lesson, and Lyam Christopher gives an answer that feels both gentle and surprising: yes, astrology is a pseudoscience, but that does not make it useless. The mistake we make is to read the stars like a giant clock, expecting the planets to turn gears and hand us a fortune. He asks us to picture something lovelier instead: the night sky as a living conversation, and astrology as the language we invented so we could join in.
The history makes the idea come alive. Before electric light and calendars on phones, people told time by the stars. Holidays were astrological events, and Christmas sits three days after the winter solstice, a little rebirth right after the sun seems to die. Places like Stonehenge were built to face those turning points, so whole communities could plant, harvest, and celebrate together. Even today, a Golden Dawn student marks the day four times with the Four Adorations, greeting the sun at dawn, noon, sunset, and midnight. The point is not prediction but connection, the feeling of being tuned to something bigger.
Then the wonder deepens. He suggests the solar system is not only a machine but an organism, even a drama, full of currents in a vast magnetic field that the planets keep stirring. Astrology becomes a doorway, a set of symbols the universe can speak through. The work in Kabbalah, Magic & the Great Work of Self Transformation uses these symbols not to show off, but to bring a student into real contact with the spirits and gods behind the planets. The loveliest idea is saved for last: you are not reaching out to grab the cosmos. The connection is already there, and magic only helps you remember it.
Full Video Transcript
all right it’s time to make another video this one is about astrology and whether it’s real or not
is it just pseudoscience what is pseudoscience something somewhat scientific make-believe science
i tend to call it a pseudoscience it’s not really a hardcore type of science you could call it a
soft science but it’s also a bit of an art okay one of the problems with astrology is that we
tend to get it all backwards nowadays astrology is a system of communication that evolved naturally
between humans and the universe it’s one of those magical systems that sort of evolved as humans
were in touch and in communion with the stars and with nature if we now take up the practice
of astrology and we don’t have that contact with nature that our ancestors had uh then astrology
becomes something we practice for its own sake. We’re no longer commuting with the stars. We are
simply doing astrology for astrology’s sake. And you can see how that leaves us sort of cut off
from the real power source behind astrology and what it is connecting us to. Any kind of system
of language or any kind of system of magic that we use can be seen as a sort of overlay that we
project out there onto the world so that what’s out there in the world can maybe possibly
use that overlay to communicate with us okay so you can see i’m kind of turning the whole thing
upside down you don’t necessarily practice astrology for because astrology is fun you
you practice astrology because it’s your way of communicating and receiving communications from
the environment and from, let’s say, from the sky. One of the things that scientists have trouble
understanding nowadays is that, especially in regard to herbalism, many shamans of indigenous
cultures will claim that, well, we came up with this herbal recipe by simply listening to the
plants. The plants told us how to make this medicine. We didn’t use trial and error to come
up with it. And that’s very difficult for modern people to understand. When we come up with medicines,
we do it by experimentation and by trial and error and refining it over time. I’m sure that’s part of
how these things developed in the past. But the most important and missing element nowadays is
that direct communication with the plants themselves. Or direct communication between
human beings and nature. And direct communication between human beings and the sky, the stars,
the planets things like that okay so uh if you were to practice astrology legitimately
you would first establish contact with the stars by stargazing and going out under the night sky
and experiencing the sky or arcing overhead experiencing the seasons firsthand by being
out there in nature maybe doing some gardening or or some agriculture and tuning into the
energies of the seasons the best time to plant you know the best time to take advantage of the
migration of particular types of prey things like that uh that now if you take up the practice of
astrology first and you don’t get out under the sky and commune with the stars um you can still
develop some benefit from that but hopefully it’s going to get you appreciating the forces behind
the astrological system like what kind of forces are you contacting and communicating with so let’s
talk about um the notion of a holiday um a holiday nowadays is very often something that’s
commercialized uh right now i think we just today even might be saint patrick’s day i think i’m not
sure um and i’ve already seen numerous ads of oh this is where you can go out drinking tonight or
here’s how to make your beer green um and a lot of uh holiday time now especially like for
christmas and things like that and new year’s they’re very commercialized so people take
advantage of the fact that people celebrate holidays holidays originally were astrological
events for instance christmas is december 25th which is more or less three days after the winter
solstice so in other words there’s a sort of death that happens at the winter solstice and
three days after there’s a resurrection okay or a birth in this case right uh so three days after
the death of the god the god is once again is born again you could call it a resurrection but
or just a rebirth okay and there are many different uh deities or savior savior deities that are
supposedly born on december 25th that’s giving you one example uh and these holidays largely
existed because of their astrological correspondences. And celebrating the holidays
was a way of communing with nature, with the natural world. If you think of sites like Stonehenge,
you can very easily see how that was a major ritual center for a civilization that existed
back then. And the configuration of Stonehenge was a way of aligning the community around it
to the influence of the stars and then of course they would have certain times of year
which they could predict using the configuration of Stonehenge and they would celebrate
these various they would have these various festivals and those festivals would punctuate
their year in regards to when to plant when to harvest when to take advantage of this particular
migration of an animal like say birds or some kind of livestock or something like that
um so these holidays were essentially astrological events nowadays holidays have lost touch with
that and one thing you can do as a magical practice is reclaim that you can reclaim
holidays that are astrological in nature such as the summer solstice or the spring equinox
and you can then celebrate them just for what they are.
This is similar to the way that a Golden Dawn student would do the four adorations.
We celebrate four times during the day for sunrise, noon, sunset, and midnight.
There are also four times of the year, which are spring, summer, fall, winter,
the spring and winter solstice that spring and autumn equinoxes and the and the summer solstice
and the winter solstice it’s almost like there are four times a day there are four times of the year
okay and these configurations uh these fourfold configurations are ways of connecting to nature
and maintaining that connection to nature because what has happened to humans is that in their sort
of egoic consciousness they feel separate from nature and now there’s a need to connect okay
one of the difficulties we have when we think of astrology is well is it an art is it a science
what exactly is it all right so you might want to look at what science actually is why does science
exist science’s main purposes are to predict behavior of the to predict behavior of the cosmos
and to control things so to to predict what nature is going to do and to control nature
to be able to produce results and control it okay so science in essence is kind of a control freakish
kind of discipline especially nowadays it’s becoming increasingly divorced from nature
like if you take organic chemistry it’s mostly about configuring molecules so that you can come
up with a really expensive formula that you can sell to people and you can patent it and you can
go to the amazon and you can find something a nature that the shamans there are using you can
find a medicine that shamans are using and then you can figure out what the active ingredient is
and then you can go to your lab and make a synthetic version of it and charge lots of money
for it because you know how the molecules work okay so science tends to be a way to
control things and to take advantage of things mysticism mysticism is a way of connecting human
beings to the cosmos so human beings the way we have evolved we feel sort of estranged from nature
we’re sort of outside of it looking around us going how is it that we’ve become these entities
that are sort of separate from nature and now we feel like nature is sort of doing things to us and
Now we’re doing things to it.
The reality, of course, quite obviously, is that we are nature.
We have come out of nature.
We haven’t come into nature from some other place, from some other universe.
We have grown out of nature.
And so mysticism is a way of reaffirming that and reconnecting to nature.
All right.
So now magic has the goal of sort of both.
It’s both the mysticism and the science.
um it is to the goal of magic is to thrive as an individual let’s say um based on our connection
to the natural world so yeah magic is a way of basically being united to the forces of nature
but also thriving because of that okay so in that a good example that would be getting up and then
exposing yourself to the first rays of the sun as they come up over the horizon
and maybe also watching the sunset at night so you really get in touch with the full cycle of
your day and this is why you know the neophyte in the golden dawn would do the four adorations
to get in touch with the rising sun the sun at noon the sunset and the sun at midnight it’s one
of those ways of getting in touch with nature okay and of course being in touch with nature
supposedly empowers you and that’s the uh essence of magic okay um so now astrology is a system
it’s sort of a four fourfold system the way i’ve been describing that can be used to connect to
the natural world and to the sky and to the universe okay and what you’ll notice is that
what it has become is more like a it’s trying to be science that’s why we call it pseudoscience
it’s trying to be a little scientific and uh so it’s about predicting and maybe uh you know
exploiting taking advantage of the things that are going on around you okay yeah uh when if we make
it a more natural immersive experience then astrology could be a way of taking advantage
of the energies that that arise at certain times of the year okay or even at certain times of the
day okay so that’s the important aspect of it i think um why astrology is silly okay it’s yeah it
tends to be overly systematized and it becomes a sort of mechanistic system it kind of regards
the heavens as a sort of clockwork uh thing going on with gears turning and uh and then you have the
houses which are like really sharply divided compartments uh from the uh between the two
horizons uh there are 12 different houses where uh if a planet is in a particular house at a
particular time it has a particular effect and then suddenly it clicks over like clunk goes
over into the next house and then has a different effect okay and same with the uh the signs of the
zodiac which which also you know turn around the earth but if the planet is in a particular sign
it supposedly has this particular effect on what’s happening below and as you can tell when
you look at an astrological chart it does tend to overdo it as far as trying to make a sort of
clockwork mechanistic version of the universe okay so the way to rescue it from that is to see it as
a language of communication and like i said before the psyche the psyche of the universe seems to
enjoy being systematized so when you when you superimpose a system on top of it it’s it will
it it may very likely respond and start communicating with you in terms of that system
okay but the importance here is that you want to focus on nature itself or the sky itself or the
universe itself and not necessarily get all caught up within the system and now the system is telling
you what to do the system is merely a language of communication okay so that’s the important thing
so astrology becomes silly when when you practice astrology for just for the sake of astrology
and all you’re doing is looking at your computer screen and it’s telling you where the planets are
things like that okay now it doesn’t mean you need to go out under the sky and practice astrology
that way what i’m saying is that there’s something behind astrology there’s something out there in
the world that you’re trying to reconnect with and you’re using astrology to do it and so that
natural phenomenon that you you are now regarding through the lens of astrology is more important
than astrology itself okay so even if you’re not out there looking at the stars directly with your
naked eyes um there is a reality out there beyond your astrological system that astrology
is merely uh communicating with it it is a tool that you use to communicate with the external
or the supposedly external world okay now there really isn’t an external world but you won’t
really realize that until you start to use astrology to communicate with it and then you
sort of you gradually begin to realize that there is no separation between me and the external world
so how is astrology valid well it first of all it views the solar system as an organism
so it kind of sees everything as alive and so as uh it doesn’t need to be seen as a sort of
clockwork machine like universe it can be seen instead as a dynamic system in which energies
come and go they rise and fall so there’s a dynamic living system that goes through various
cycles so um astrology helps you see the solar system and the universe as a living thing i think
it’s preposterous nowadays that um we have to propose a theory like the gaia hypothesis and
and say that it’s a well it’s just a theory the gaia hypothesis the gaia hypothesis is that the
earth is an organism that it’s actually alive it’s an entity um to somebody with mystical
attainment or magical attainment that’s a no-brainer there’s no need to prove that it’s
painfully obvious that the universe is alive okay and somehow we’ve gotten into this modernistic
psychology that regards it as dead and that it’s basically just raise extensa as descartes said
that it’s just uh empty space full of chunks of debris that are just floating out there
there’s no soul out there the only soul that exists is inside you and everything outside of
you is dead pretty much and uh is mechanistic uh even to the point of looking at plants and
animals as though they have no soul either and that they’re just there for you to use and abuse
or uh to take advantage of for for your capitalistic society or you know something like
that uh also regards uh that one of the valid things or one of the valid principles of astrology
is that um the the solar system is an immense electromagnetic field the sun fills the entire
solar system with uh negatively charged plasma uh negative and positively positively charged plasma
OK, there’s a big magnetic bubble around the solar system created by the sun, a magnetic field.
And within that field, there’s an ebbing and flowing of various currents in the plasma.
And the planets, as they go around the sun, sort of stretch and tweak that electromagnetic field and cause currents in it to flow back and forth.
And so the interesting thing about, the valid thing about astrology is that it acknowledges the magnetic field around the sun and how that has a tendency to influence what happens here on Earth.
and so if jupiter and mars are in a particular configuration uh then that’s going to have some
kind of impact on the events that happen here and science is beginning to understand this that
the solar system is not only gravitational but also electromagnetic and where the planets are
sitting at any any particular time are going to tweak that magnetic field and have an influence
on uh what happens on earth how much influence uh it’s hard to say but apparently mystics for
several thousand years now have known about this uh and of course if you are immersed in nature
nature does tend to communicate this to you it’s hard for us to see that now because we
we feel so cut off from nature being here i am inside my air-conditioned house you know
and of course if i’m trying to use astrology while in this setting it’s a bit of a challenge
because i i run the risk of just uh engaging in astrology as a form of mental masturbation
and there’s really no connection between me and the universe then if i’m just engaging with it
that way like it’s a game or something like that also another advantage another valid thing about
astrology and i like this one even better and that is to view the universe and to view the
solar system as not only an organism but also a drama now each of the planets has a particular
character and so as these characters dance around one another forming various configurations
they express various qualities uh within each of us so that’s also a very interesting thing to view
the universe as a drama uh and not only as an organism but also as a drama and of course uh
in regards to golden dawn magic uh it’s not necessary it’s not really necessary to have to
go out under the stars and practice your astrological magic that way that is very nice
to do that um the main thing on the the main thing that exists beyond your let’s say you have
astrology you project a sort of astrological version of the universe around you to try to
make meaning of what’s happening around you on the other side of that system that you’re projecting
upon the world there are the actual spirits and gods there are entities out there that are
non-material that you can actually have develop a relationship with okay and so when it comes to
the curriculum and the in the kabbalah magic book primarily what that system is doing is getting you
in contact with those spirits and gods of the planets of the elements all right uh and so
astrology is a mean it’s like an overlay or an intermediate zone that helps you communicate with
those um entities that apparently exist all around you uh what kind of contact to the universe
what what kind of contact do we have with the universe obviously we have um what happens with
four adorations where we we tune in to the sunrise the sun at noon sunset and midnight
and this helps us get into a more healthy circadian rhythm which makes us more healthy
human beings so we get into a rhythm with the sun not not only should we do the four adorations but
But we should also expose ourselves to the raw elements of nature, to sunlight, to heat and cold, to starlight, to moonlight, to natural foods, actual foods, not synthetic foods.
And, of course, to the spirits of nature that sort of exist beneath the appearances of all of these things that we are connecting to.
And one of the most interesting things about astrology is that it tends to give us a way of tuning into the electromagnetic field of the universe, since that whole electromagnetic field is constantly sort of morphing and changing because of the way the planets tend to distort or morph that electromagnetic field as they orbit the sun.
And yes, you can get sensitive to these energies.
And within those energies, it would appear that there are various intelligences that you can contact by using the configuration of astrology and using the astrological symbols or the imagery that are associated with signs of the zodiac, things like that.
So astrology, if we are to rescue it from just being a game of mental masturbation, it is a language by which we can communicate with the universe, especially sort of the electromagnetic universe or the etheric universe, whatever that is.
So how does this affect you in your daily magical work?
well the uh the student of magic um draws a magic circle every day like as with the lesser
banishing ritual of the pentagram and the ritual of the hexagram uh they are also the symbol of
the cross let’s say the equal armed cross um in other words that uh the way we have evolved
tends to put us in a sort of fourfold um way of looking at the at the world uh if we are walking
around in nature we have what’s directly in front of us we have things from off to the side and we
have things from behind us there’s also above and below okay and so uh we tend to be conscious of
the things that are right and left the forward and backward and above and below you see that
fourfold cross system uh tends to be the way our nervous system works uh and that overlay that we
sort of naturally have with the world is now taken advantage of with the various sigils and
magic so like the the cross and the circle uh these are way these are um the basic symbols
of communication that we use to experience union with the universe um also the triangle
the square these are also basic um symbols uh that tend to carry forth a lot of meaning
between us and the natural world back and forth triangle square circle and cross and there are
other symbols as well and of course the four quarters when we when we when we’re in standing
in our magical circle, obviously to the south, that’s the quarter of fire. To the east is the
quarter of air. And as you probably realize by now, the four quarters around you also
are emblematic of the four seasons. Spring would be east, summer would be south, autumn would be
west and winter would be north and so uh and so you’re if you want to communicate with a spiritual
force that is corresponds to winter like the land of the dead things like that um you would turn to
the north and you have a sort of systematic overlay do the spirits of the dead really exist
to the north no not really uh but you have created this system of correspondences that
helps you now tune into that okay this is what astrology really is it’s a language of communication
a system of communication between you and the world uh interesting thing is that once you have
established that connection the whole system of astrology changes then it’s uh what’s going to
happen once you start to commune with the natural world you’re going to change the system of
astrology and the system of magic that you have been using it you’re going to start to customize
it for yourself and this is what happens when when students get to the five equal sixth grade
they begin to customize magic their own magical system this is why grimoires are usually not that
helpful they’re fascinating to read but a grimoire is essentially a system of communication that
another magician came up with in order to communicate with nature and the cosmos okay
and that system that that particular mage came up with is not necessarily going to work for you
okay because that person’s karma was different from your karma okay so when people uh you know
reach the five equals six grade and they keep doing the same golden dawn stuff in other words
oh now i’m going to do the higher grade system that the golden dawn i become suspicious of that
because really by five equals six you should start creating your own magical system um yeah it’s going
to be it’s going to probably be similar to what people practice with astrology or you know alchemy
and stuff like that it’s going to have similarities but it’s going to have a lot of customization
you’re going to start to make your own version of magic because now you you’re starting so
supposedly you’re now getting in touch with the natural world and with the cosmos that union with
the universe is beginning to happen okay one of the most important things about your communication
with the universe is also that central axis so um when you’re standing within your magical circle
uh the middle pillar is a very important part of that as well um and you have to remember though
that when the most important thing is that you have that re-established connection to the universe
um so when people talk about magic and it’s all about what system you’re using and this system
works this way and you can’t change it or whatever like um no no no no but once you use that system
to establish your connection to the universe then the system is no longer that important anymore
okay and what’s going to happen is that your your connection with the the cosmos is then going to
determine what your system of communication looks like okay so um i’ve seen it happen with students
like they basically you you’re doing the outer order work on the golden dawn and you have to do
everything according to the way you’ve been directed to do it but eventually uh something
clicks and then you begin to create your own magical system okay it’s not very accurate to
say that because that system evolves on its own it’s not you who’s deciding to create it now
it’s more like with your communion with the universe is now create is now evolving a magical
system that is now sort of custom fit to the way that you maintain your connection and your
communication with the universe so is is astrology pseudoscience uh yes it is does that mean it’s
invalid no it’s up to you like if you can use astrology or any system of magic for that matter
to establish your union with the cosmos uh then you’re using it correctly as far as i’m concerned
okay if but if you’re engaging with it for its own sake you’re just practicing
astrology because astrology is cool whatever that’s not necessarily going to
be that helpful okay hmm but of course the fool who persists in his folly will
become wise and so people who just kind of play with astrology because
astrology seems cool they can still by accident stumble upon union with the
cosmos okay now when i talk about um uniting yourself to the cosmos i really don’t mean like
reaching out and touching it and now i’m connected okay if you’re reaching out and touching the
forces around you in the natural world that is not the connection i’m talking about okay so the
these various systems of magic such as astrology can help you um experience the connection to
the cosmos that you already have not a connection that you establish by reaching out to it okay so
if you try to unite yourself to the universe by reaching out and touching it you have you haven’t
understood correctly you’ve missed the point okay so uh these various systems of magic such as
astrology and other systems like tarot and whatever um they are a means of seeing the
connection that was always there if if you try to establish that connection as though it’s not there
you have missed the mark you you and that’s of course the problem because people feel cut off
and so they try to connect to the universe by uh touching it okay it’s fine to do that but you have
to realize that if I try to go out there and run after nature and chase after it, then I’m
basically caught up in a karmic cycle. I’m chasing after nature in order to unite with it. What I
really should be doing is using magic to notice the connection that already exists, that somehow
I’ve lost consciousness of. I can’t seem to feel my connection anymore. That connection never went
away it’s always been there and of course once you realize that then things start to take off
okay and it’s almost a very strange thing to say too because once you establish that connection
then a system like astrology is not necessarily a communication between you and the universe
because that that idea of between would be dualistic it would indicate that you are separate
from the universe okay so it’s not even a system of communication anymore when it’s functioning
properly uh it just becomes a sort of natural uh outgrowth the way that a flower petal connects
a flower to the space around it i don’t know something like that okay so uh yeah so the idea
if probably the best way to look at the universe around you is like to to to um see your sense of
separation from it as an illusion and then any system that you use to bridge the gap between you
and the cosmos is also an illusion okay the the system that you’re using to connect yourself to
the universe around you uh is simply a reminder of your connection not an establisher of your
connection so if you let’s say you visualize the wheel of the zodiac around you and you visualize
of various planets circling around your ritual space these things are not connecting you to the
universe per se they are simply emblematic of your connection to it that already exists so i’m hoping
that might help i might i always when i do these videos i very often become worried that it just
doesn’t make sense people won’t understand okay so um and what we’ve just established here is that
When somebody criticizes astrology, the criticism is very often valid because it tends to posit a clockwork type universe, an overly scientific universe that looks like gears in some kind of cosmic machine.
And of course, that’s silly because the universe isn’t really like that.
Now, that’s a sort of steampunk version of the universe.
Does the universe enjoy being viewed that way?
to an extent it might it might enjoy having that system um projected on top of it but the problem
becomes uh the problem results when you take that system literally as though the system itself is
the reality no no no no uh it that overlay is simply a means of understanding what’s going on
around you and having that system point out your union with the cosmos that has always been there
okay well i hope that makes sense all right so uh that is about is astrology real or is it not real
does it work does it not work uh it does work but the importance is to use it as a non-dual
sort of philosophy it’s kind of a way of looking at your dualistic mindset as like me and the cosmos
and then the system of astrology can be used as a means of seeing the unity between you and the
cosmos if you’re using it if you’re using a system of magic to intensify your separation from the
cosmos that can be that’s just going to make things worse in your life pretty much okay so
these various systems of magic are ultimately best applied to pointing out the connection that
has always been there. All right, until next time.
Source: Lyam Christopher